Stress Management Tips for Turbulent Advocates (INFJ-T): Self-Compassion in Chaos

As an Advocate (INFJ) personality type, you probably realize that your presence can bring a sense of calm to those around you. And in a world that can feel heavy, chaotic, and almost overwhelming, that’s a wonderful thing. Your empathy, compassion, and altruistic nature often fuel your actions and the choices that you make. But as you show up for others, are you also being intentional about your own well-being?

We Advocates are known for putting the needs of others before our own. It’s an admirable trait, but it can make us feel overextended and stressed. While too many responsibilities and life’s seemingly endless stressors can affect most people, Turbulent Advocates (INFJ-T) are more prone than their counterparts with the Assertive personality trait to feeling the weight of the world on their shoulders. And as the saying goes, you can’t pour from an empty cup. So to continue to show up for the people you love, champion the causes that you’re passionate about, and do the things that genuinely bring you joy, you’ll need to make sure that you’re managing your stress in restorative and healthy ways.

However, before you take steps to manage or eliminate the stressors in your life, you’ll first need to acknowledge them. Admitting that you’re stressed or struggling doesn’t make you a failure. It’s okay to admit that you’re overwhelmed with your current workload or having difficulty keeping up with responsibilities. Actually, it’s more than okay.

As a Turbulent Advocate myself, this is something that I struggle with. And since Advocates are such rare personality types, it’s easy to feel lonely while sitting with my stress and anxiety. But I know there are many others in this fight. In this article, I’ll be sharing tips that have helped me manage stress over the years (especially on days when all I want to do is hide under the covers), and I truly hope that they’ll help you too.

1. Release the Idea of Perfection

Advocate personalities are idealistic. We tend to have big goals and dreams of changing the world – or, at the very least, making our side of the street a little brighter. However, this attachment to creating perfection can often end up causing stress in our lives. Releasing the need for flawlessness can immediately improve your stress levels and lighten your mental load.

It’s hard to be truly happy if you’re constantly, even subconsciously, searching for better. Of course, there’s always room for improvement, but that is different from trying to perfect something. There’s a saying, “Done is better than perfect,” which means that even if you didn’t get every detail right, it’s more important to finish a task and tick it off of your to-do list. Sure, perfectionism may seem like a great trait initially, but it can contribute to issues with overall mental health. An attachment to perfection may also lead to burnout, which you might not even see or feel coming until it’s already happening.

Giving yourself room to make mistakes is a great way to let go of perfectionism. You are more than your work or the things that you create. You can have your big dreams by taking small steps that align more with your purpose than with being perfect.

2. Talk to Yourself Like a Friend

Most people have an inner critic. You know that voice that can sometimes be useful in helping us accomplish our goals? It can motivate us and keep us on our path. But for some Turbulent Advocates, this voice can drown out everything else and become harmful. When this happens, it’s called negative self-talk. As a Turbulent Advocate personality type, I often feel like my own worst critic. But over the years, I’ve realized that the best way to eradicate this is by treating myself like a friend.

Think about it: sometimes you make a mistake or fall short and immediately start thinking of all the ways that you’re at fault. You start mentally berating yourself and trying to devise ways to push yourself to improve. But what if this happened to your friend? What if your friend approached you and confided in you that they had made an error? Surely you wouldn’t call them stupid, would you?

If you start talking to yourself like you’d speak to a loved one in a similar situation, you’ll eventually stop putting so much pressure on yourself. It’s important to be kind to yourself. Shift away from the negative self-talk, and start giving yourself the same grace that you’re so quick to extend to others. You deserve it.

3. Embrace Self-Care

Self-care has become such a buzzword over the last few years. These days, you’d be hard-pressed to scroll through social media without seeing someone jetting off to a tropical island, taking a spa day, or splurging on some overpriced accessory – all in the name of “self-care.” But self-care may look slightly different for Turbulent Advocate personalities who are trying to alleviate stress.

In your case, for self-care to have the desired effect, it must be intentional. Before diving in, take a moment to think about what taking care of yourself looks and feels like. Do you feel better after releasing your deepest emotions onto the pages of your journal? Is your mind more settled after losing a few hours in your favorite hobbies? Do you feel centered and ready to face your troubles after a meditation session? Do you come back feeling refreshed and renewed after spending the day splashing around at the beach with friends? Does focusing on the things that you’re grateful for offer a much-needed shift in perspective? Or perhaps you feel empowered after setting and sticking to a boundary? Figuring out what self-care looks like for you is the first step to truly embracing it and using it in your stress management arsenal.

And please remember: carving out time in your schedule to care for yourself isn’t self-indulgence – it’s self-preservation. You don’t need to earn it.

4. Step Away for a Moment

If you find yourself stressing to come up with a solution for a problem but can’t seem to get it right, try stepping away for a while. This may sound incredibly counterintuitive to you, and your brain might struggle to actually let itself rest, but sometimes genius strikes when you least expect it. And, sometimes, you just need a break.

Elizabeth, an editor here at 16Personalities and a Turbulent Advocate personality, says that getting up and moving away from the problem at hand is her go-to method for dealing with stress. And since our stress-focused chat, it’s become a method that I’ve learned to adopt as well.

“I may not solve my problems by taking a long walk or washing the dishes, but doing so gives me a chance to relegate my worries to a secondary part of my brain. The concerns are still there, waiting to be puzzled over, but other tasks – watching for traffic, picking out the best apples at the grocery store, folding my laundry – take center stage. I’ll still be able to take some brief moments to think about my problems, but I can’t focus all of my thoughts on them for more than a minute here and there. My anxieties will be waiting for me when I finish whatever task or exercise I’ve set before myself, but putting my stress on a mental back burner allows me to take a step away, let the initial worry fade to a more manageable level, and come back feeling calmer, more collected, and ready to find a solution,” she explained.

5. Lean on Your Support System

Whenever I feel stressed, I tend to isolate myself from those closest to me. I’d never want to feel like a burden to anyone. And the thought of those around me thinking that I was failing at something is usually more than enough to force me to keep my head down and navigate my stressful moments alone. The thing is, more often than not, these thoughts and feelings aren’t rooted in reality but stem from the insecurities that I hold close to my chest. Opening up doesn’t come easily for me, and as a fellow Turbulent Advocate personality type, maybe it doesn’t come easily for you either. But always isolating yourself during these tough moments is one of the least helpful things that you can do for yourself.

We Turbulent Advocate personalities value deep and meaningful relationships. These kinds of connections usually require a great deal of vulnerability. Your empathy allows you to be a safe place for your friends and family, so why not let them hold space for you too? You don’t even have to spend your time together baring your soul. You could gather your tribe for a movie night, a house party, or even a yoga session.

If you’ve spent time cultivating and nurturing these relationships, allow yourself to be supported by them. Chances are it’ll not only help you through your stressful moments but also strengthen your bond.

Conclusion: Be Gentle with Yourself in the Face of Stress!

At the end of the day, stress affects everyone – some more than others. Yes, your Turbulent Identity makes you more susceptible to stress, but it also allows you to learn and develop amazing techniques to tackle life’s stressors.

For people who’ve spent most of their lives evading pressure, the experience of being hit with sudden difficulties, overwhelming situations, or unexpected day-to-day complications could be catastrophic. But for you and your personality type, you’ve already got a game plan. Chances are you’ve already considered all the ways that most situations could go wrong, and you’ve developed a plan and a backup plan, just in case. That isn’t to say that you’re overly pessimistic or that your approach to life is one of despair. It’s simply an acknowledgment that your perceived weaknesses can be your strengths – if harnessed correctly.

When you face your stress head-on, you allow yourself to find new ways to blossom. You allow yourself to move closer to those big dreams and aspirations by taking slow, structured steps. There’s no limit to what you can achieve, and I hope that these techniques will nudge you in the right direction. Be gentle with yourself as you become your best and truest version of yourself.